Rahvin:
Science takes exactly one thing on faith: that what we observe is actually what is happening. We take on faith that, when we look at the moon at night, we're actually looking at the moon and not trapped inside of the Matrix.
I think you need to be more specific. Since mathematics is the tool used for understanding this stuff, can we not agree that science is faith in logic, and that the universe is ordered in an intelligible way?
Rahvin:
Where we run into problems here is in the explanations to laypeople, particularly laypeople with no physics training whatsoever, and most especially with laypeople who have no physics education and have a predetermined cosmological view based on their religion.
Furthermore, what is your theistic position? I ask, because the model you refer to, is based upon a philosophy of materialism, that has certain theistic implications and
not others.
Allow me to explain:
Scientific Reasoning vs. Religious Reasoning?
The conflict between science and religion is not over the existence of God because the terms God and reality are synonymous.
God / 1 capitalized : the supreme or ultimate reality God Definition & Meaning - Merriam-Webster
Reality is absolute, ultimate, and sovereign. The question is really one of
God’s (or reality's) characteristics or nature.
Is reality a living being, or merely an impersonal material force?
Whatever or whoever reality is; reality is God by definition. It is what it is or I am who I am.
The only difference between the philosophies of naturalism and monotheism is the nature of God.
All reasoning is philosophical. Whether we use inductive or deductive reasoning (and we rely almost exclusively on deduction) contradiction and coherence are what we seek in order to verify or refute premises and conclusions.
It matters not whether our philosophy is monotheistic, pantheistic, polytheistic, atheistic, etc. The deist philosophizes that
Theo (God) has left the building. All philosophy is theistic. Even the agnostic is in the same boat, since his philosophy purposely excludes deciding the question of Theo. To put it plainly, without theism, there is no such thing as an agnostic. The absolute character of reality (irrespective of its/his other qualities) does not give us the option of excluding ourselves from philosophizing about
Theo.
So Rahvin, my point is not to challenge the logic of your view. It is logical. My point (and the point of many others) is that all of us smuggle in a theological view that is not directly observable by way of empirical observation.
You don't have the authority to exalt a 'materialistic worldview' of reality as objective and unbiased.